Jack Campbell - Imperfect Sword

“I could lie—” Iceni began.

“I wish you wouldn’t.”

That had come out with more force than Drakon had probably intended, Iceni thought. “—but I’ll tell you the truth,” she continued smoothly. “I wanted a backup. I knew that Kommodor Marphissa would accept something that she knew was from you. But you were going into battle. Something might have happened to you. I wanted Colonel Malin to have a means of letting the Kommodor know that he could be trusted.”

Drakon studied her, looking perplexed. “You trust Colonel Malin? When did that happen?”

“Over time,” Iceni replied with a shrug.

“Even after you found out he was Morgan’s son and had kept that information from me?”

“Yes.”

“I’ll be honest with you. I don’t know what the hell to think of that.”

Iceni met his eyes. She didn’t have to pretend to be speaking the truth as she continued. “Artur, I felt confident that Colonel Malin would not betray you. If Colonel Rogero had been going along, I would have given him the code phrase, but he stayed here. It was about ensuring that Kommodor Marphissa would know when a critical message was authentic, and it worked as intended. Without that code phrase, she could not have learned the situation on the ground in time to intervene as she did.”

Blowing out a long breath, Drakon sat back again, his eyes hard. “I would have preferred knowing. As it is, even though it indeed worked very well, it feels like a measure taken not as insurance for me but insurance against me.”

“That’s not true.” Iceni surprised herself with the heat of her reply. “It was not based on any fear of you, or distrust of you. But I thought if you knew Colonel Malin had the code phrase, it would cause you to distrust him, or anyone else with such a phrase.”

Drakon nodded. “That’s probably right. I know you didn’t trust Conner Gaiene.”

She looked away, distressed. “I am very sorry that he died, Artur. He was not my favorite man, but his death ennobled him.”

“Conner was always that noble man inside. He had just gotten very good at hiding it,” Drakon said, his voice heavy. “You and Colonel Kai haven’t interacted much, that I know of—”

“We haven’t,” Iceni said.

“So it makes sense that you would have entrusted Malin with that code phrase.” He looked straight at her again. “But I would very much not want to have that sort of thing happen again without my knowledge.”

She could tell that Colonel Malin would have some pointed questions directed at him when Drakon got back to his headquarters. If Drakon stopped trusting Malin at all, it would greatly lessen his effectiveness as a source of information for her. “I should also tell you that Colonel Malin thought you were already aware of the arrangement.”

Drakon paused, searching her face. “You misled him as well?”

“That’s what we do, isn’t it?” She had been hoping for more openness with Drakon, for a lowering of barriers, but he obviously had plenty of defenses up, so she could scarcely afford to lower hers. “But I will not take such actions again.”

He took several seconds to answer, then spoke with care. “There are forces working to keep us distrustful of each other. We can’t afford to let them succeed.”

“Forces?” Iceni asked. “Do you mean the Syndicate?”

“Certainly the Syndicate. Divide and conquer is an old CEO tactic. But maybe your assistant Togo as well. And maybe…” He gave her a look that carried an admission of his own failure. “Maybe that’s part of what Colonel Morgan wanted.”

Iceni’s smile was hard and cold. “I don’t know about you, but I hate being yanked around on anyone’s strings.”

“I never cared for it, either.”

“Then let’s move forward,” she said. “We can’t lose sight of the fact that we did win both here and at Ulindi.”

He nodded to her. “Or the fact that we won at Ulindi because you sent the battleship there.”

“Oh, hell, Artur, that battleship could have done nothing but avenge you if you hadn’t saved yourself and your soldiers.” She looked back at the star display. “Speaking of being yanked around, have you been told the message the Dancers sent to us?”

“Colonel Rogero passed it on,” Drakon said. “ Watch the different stars. Do we have any idea what that means?”

“I talked to our astrophysicists,” Iceni said, “and according to them, all stars are different. No two stars are identical.”

“Why would the Dancers tell us to watch all stars? And if they wanted us to do that, why wouldn’t they say watch all the stars ? What is it the Dancers expect us to do?”

Iceni smiled humorlessly, leaning back in her seat. “Or, what is it the Dancers are trying to manipulate us into doing? I get the impression that the Alliance is taking the Dancers at their words, as if they are completely sincere, truthful, and guileless.”

Drakon raised both eyebrows. “Seriously?”

“Yes. Whereas you and I know that no one, no matter their external shape, is completely sincere, truthful, and guileless. The Dancers have an agenda. They want us to do certain things, which may be to our benefit, or may be to the benefit of the Dancers.”

“They did save this planet,” Drakon pointed out.

“Agreed. Which would give them every right to express their wishes openly to us because we owe them payment for that debt. Instead, they offer vague warnings.”

Drakon shook his head, looking stubborn. “That doesn’t make sense. It’s hard enough to make people do what you want when you directly tell them what you want. Trying to manipulate them with vague statements is likely to make them do the opposite of what you want.”

“Maybe the Dancers don’t realize that. Maybe they’re using a tactic that works with Dancers.”

“Maybe.” Drakon eyed the star display, rubbing his chin as he thought. “Let’s assume that for whatever reason, the Dancers think that message is useful. Different stars. All right. I spent a lot of time in the Syndicate ground forces as opposed to the government or industry branches. To me, watch is a cautionary word. It means you’re looking for danger, or guarding something.”

She sat forward. “Then the Dancers would be telling us to guard or be on guard somewhere? That’s nothing we don’t already know.”

“Somewhere different ,” Drakon said. “Which would mean not the usual places, or the places we’re already doing that.”

Iceni indicated the star display. “We’ve had a couple of enigma ships show up at the jump point from Pele while you were gone. They appear, turn, and jump back to Pele.”

“Scouts,” Drakon said. “We saw one right after we got back.”

“Yes. Keeping an eye on us and what we’re doing. The first one showed up while there were only a few cruisers and Hunter-Killers here, plus our battle cruiser Pele . That worried me that the enigmas would launch an attack as soon as possible, having seen our relative weakness. But the second enigma ship showed up after you and the Midway had returned.”

“So they saw we have some teeth,” Drakon said. “But the Dancers must have known we are already watching the jump point from Pele. That can’t be what they were talking about.” He paused. “A warning to watch different stars. It has to be related to the enigmas, not the Syndicate. The only place we know of that the enigmas can access human space is through Pele, then here at Midway. Were the Dancers telling us to worry about the enigmas being able to reach other stars? Different stars than Midway?”

Iceni gave him a startled look. “That is plausible. Black Jack gave us some star charts showing enigma territory.” Inwardly cursing Togo’s absence, which meant he wasn’t here to do this, Iceni played with the display’s controls until it zoomed out and framed a wide region of space. “There. This is the picture Black Jack’s fleet put together from actually traversing part of enigma space and from what they could get out of the Dancers.”